Politics Centrelink

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CheapCharlie said:
It most likely is hundreds of thousands who don't want to work. That in itself is not a high percentage of the working age population of Australia

The question becomes whether or not as a society we accept that
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By all means deal with the workshy but the government should be better able to help serious job seekers instead of treating all unemployed as workshy.
 
Silent Alarm said:
But that's redundant to the conversation really, because people who can do cashies in labouring have a skill. A proper skill. They've gone past the apprentice stage. Most of these people will do cashies for mates and friends of friends now and then but not many people are making $200,000 a year from cashies and getting Centrelink too.

Where people used to do it, commonly, was working at a pub/café/restaurant while at school, in a gap year, studying, or in limbo, but it's basically impossible now. My local pub, the bar girl was saying if they get offered cashies it's for a very last minute shift and generally a hundred bucks for five hours. Most places literally do not have that much physical cash in a till. You can't be paying the six people behind the bar their 10-hour shift in cash because it doesn't exist. Maybe everyone gets a short Sunday shift a week on it but that's it. The people who work at said pub are studying all sorts from engineering, to writing thesis papers, radiology... somehow their 200 invisible bucks once a month and the $60 they skim off Centrelink every pay cycle will be paid back, I reckon.

The main issue, which comes from this here too, is under-employment and the casualisation of the work force.

I reckon the main 'users' of Centrelink now are these people – the skimmers. I was one.

I had a job that paid me entirely as they should have – they simply couldn't do cash in hand – and I was on Centrelink because sometimes I'd made $800 a week, other times $500 a fortnight. Sometimes I'd get bupkis from Centrelink, other times it'd just be 70 bucks or even 58 cents, and sometimes if it was a lean period or I was somewhere else I'd get the full payment. It works well and it was a crutch. When I struggled paying rent, that Centrelink borderline saved me from having to have my parents bail out half a ****in' rent agreement.

In all my years going there (I first got it at 18 going to uni), the one big demographic shift has been... a broader one.

Back in the day, people were generally mentally ill, recent immigrants, Aboriginals, and a splattering of students sitting down trying to tap into the wifi on their MacBooks Pros. Now I see a huge amount of late 20s people, but the biggest thing is those between about 43 and 65. Well dressed, quiet, decent, and people who probably own a house or have brought up children, have a degree or trade, have a ****in clue but the world is getting more and more difficult for the average person to navigate. You walk in a Centrelink and it's no different to walking down a street. There is clearly a generation of people who aren't especially well versed in computers or smart phones and maybe can't type and set-out a resumé these days (but they aren't dumb) who are in the gap between bonafide boomers who never needed a computer at work, and people who do every single day. People are clearly in there for rent assistance, for those 50-bucks-a-pay-cycle top-ups... cruel ****in game.
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What you say about the Pub Workers/Students and the poor says to me we have gone overboard with education.

13 years schooling + a degree + unpaid experience (today they're called internships but are the same) is overkill. Those that are willing and able to go to Uni and learn really specialised skills (preferably making up the poverty with a higher income later) can do and the rest should be out working ASAP. Or paid type apprenticeships vs short TAFE courses to learn the basics. All of a sudden every job no matter how easy needs loads of study that is just time wasting. 99% of job relevant skills are learnt on the job.

What you mention about lack of skills also is crucial. There are only so many white collar office/specialist jobs that can be done without a lynchpin of production yet that is what we have based our entire economy on. It is crazy.
 
Hawk Dork said:
Eventually it will be the norm that everyone is on the dole as automation takes away jobs.
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Turnbull sort of tried to work around that with the narrative Start your own Business. A variation is "The Internet is here everyone start your own business" Which in some respects is true but unless you have a skill/product/resource that is going to force someone to open their wallet you will lose a ton of money in the hope.
 

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Hawk Dork said:
Eventually it will be the norm that everyone is on the dole as automation takes away jobs.
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Automation is not a bad thing. Life in many respects is easier. And yes it will cost some jobs.

But society needs to have a plan around that or a vision of how it wants to re create itself and what it hopes to achieve. At a lower level people and communities decide how life should work/what a social contract is. This is where personal freedom comes in. Only country who has done this is China, all be it in a very very extreme way and contrary to a lot of Western beliefs. But what anyone can't argue is they have the runs on the board when 30 years ago they were a backwater in mountains of poverty to today the richest economy in the world and getting 100s of millions out of poverty.

I think the only 2 examples to the Western World are Brexit and the US. Both these cases were sections of the communities themselves saying enough is enough we are changing the status quo (why the media and establishments melted when this happened). I doubt anything will come as a) Trump doesn't really have the capacity and b) He will be blocked at every turn and in 2 years gone if the mainstream get its way.

Australia has become horribly divided and corrupt. But rather than build and innovate in a changing world (like the Kiwis have done) we seek to lash out and weaponise everything including Centrelink. Whenever some serious reform is done watch the (generally right) scream like their arms are being ripped off (i.e. Gillard).
 
CheapCharlie said:
It most likely is hundreds of thousands who don't want to work. That in itself is not a high percentage of the working age population of Australia

The question becomes whether or not as a society we accept that
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If it is that high, then the govt policy of "cracking down" clearly doesn't work.
It also is a massive failure of the job network which is either not providing sufficient help or not providing adequate skills training to job seekers.
If we are going to put the blowtorch to unemployed people because we are spending $$$$$$$$$$$ to assist them then we should also be putting the blowtorch to the job network providers who are getting a massive slice of those $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ to help these people find work.
 
Number37 said:
If it is that high, then the govt policy of "cracking down" clearly doesn't work.
It also is a massive failure of the job network which is either not providing sufficient help or not providing adequate skills training to job seekers.
If we are going to put the blowtorch to unemployed people because we are spending $$$$$$$$$$$ to assist them then we should also be putting the blowtorch to the job network providers who are getting a massive slice of those $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ to help these people find work.
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You can go back a few steps

The government is focusing on ballooning welfare payments, and using the Unemployed and disability pension recipients as the easy public relations target, to save some hundreds of millions

The focus should be on the collection of tax revenue...and those companies and high worth individuals who deliberately avoid tax...effectively stripping money out of the economy for the gain of a few
 
Run n Spread said:
Turnbull sort of tried to work around that with the narrative Start your own Business. A variation is "The Internet is here everyone start your own business" Which in some respects is true but unless you have a skill/product/resource that is going to force someone to open their wallet you will lose a ton of money in the hope.
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Yeah i sort of hear all the stuff about Entrepreneurs, and I think its like the opposite of what we need.
Say "Entrepreneurs" and i think of Chrisopher Skase and Alan Bond. Guys who find a way to line their own pockets with money sucked out of society. I pretty much see them as scam artists. ( Some stay just the other side of the line that Skase and Bond crossed ).

Say someone decides they could sell some cool shades of lipstick. They ring up a factory in China , picks some colors and the rest is marketing.
Hooray someone else found a way to make money out of selling overpriced ( ie huge profit ) crap. ( pigs fat probably ). How does that help the general population?
Its no more innovative than the marketing people flogging us Jeeps, when they realised Australian's were't aware of how bad they were. ( The Americans knew).


I'd much prefer us to have big multinationals that do something tangible and employ a lot of people.
Companies like the car makers, employed a huge variety of people.
Accountants, Engineers, Metallurgists and other material experts etc etc.
Not just smartass investers and sales people.

Our government pushes technology and research, but invariably any saleable technology goes offshore.
 
CheapCharlie said:
You can go back a few steps

The government is focusing on ballooning welfare payments, and using the Unemployed and disability pension recipients as the easy public relations target, to save some hundreds of millions

The focus should be on the collection of tax revenue...and those companies and high worth individuals who deliberately avoid tax...effectively stripping money out of the economy for the gain of a few
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There are no ballooning welfare payments. It is a beat up.
 
Number37 said:
There are no ballooning welfare payments. It is a beat up.
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Its reality
Welfare payments are increasing and will continue to increase as teh popuylation ages

https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parlia...tary_Library/pubs/BriefingBook45p/WelfareCost

"In 2016–17, the Australian Government estimates that it will spend around $158.6 billion on social security and welfare, and around $191.8 billion in 2019–20. This category of expenditure includes a broad range of payments and services including:

  • most income support payments such as pensions and allowances (for example, Newstart)
  • family payments such as Family Tax Benefit
  • paid parental leave pay
  • child care fee assistance payments
  • funding for aged care services
  • funding for disability services and
  • payments and services for veterans and their dependents."
 
CheapCharlie said:
Its reality
Welfare payments are increasing and will continue to increase as teh popuylation ages

https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parlia...tary_Library/pubs/BriefingBook45p/WelfareCost

"In 2016–17, the Australian Government estimates that it will spend around $158.6 billion on social security and welfare, and around $191.8 billion in 2019–20. This category of expenditure includes a broad range of payments and services including:

  • most income support payments such as pensions and allowances (for example, Newstart)
  • family payments such as Family Tax Benefit
  • paid parental leave pay
  • child care fee assistance payments
  • funding for aged care services
  • funding for disability services and
  • payments and services for veterans and their dependents."
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Beat up.
Far more important things to worry about.
 
CheapCharlie said:
Maybe the commercial media you listen to beats that up, but you can't change that those are the facts.
Payments are increasing and will continue to do so
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Who is changing the facts?

It is a beat up, on those facts.

There are far more important issues to concern ourselves with.
 
CheapCharlie said:
Its reality
Welfare payments are increasing and will continue to increase as teh popuylation ages

https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parlia...tary_Library/pubs/BriefingBook45p/WelfareCost

"In 2016–17, the Australian Government estimates that it will spend around $158.6 billion on social security and welfare, and around $191.8 billion in 2019–20. This category of expenditure includes a broad range of payments and services including:

  • most income support payments such as pensions and allowances (for example, Newstart)
  • family payments such as Family Tax Benefit
  • paid parental leave pay
  • child care fee assistance payments
  • funding for aged care services
  • funding for disability services and
  • payments and services for veterans and their dependents."
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The Australian federal budget is just over $400 billion and welfare spending is a core responsibility of the federal government, so using your numbers the welfare budget is about 48% which isn't that bad, interesting whenever anyone brings up the welfare budget we do not see that person ever comment on the cost of the government's employment services or the aged pension part of the welfare budget which is aged based rather than employable based.
 

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CheapCharlie said:
Maybe the commercial media you listen to beats that up, but you can't change that those are the facts.
Payments are increasing and will continue to do so
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Yes and the main driver of that is the aged pension, which will continue to rise as the baby boomers move into retirement but here is the good news, the population that follows is smaller and will benefit from compulsory super so the rise will moderate over time.
 
Bombermania said:
The Australian federal budget is just over $400 billion and welfare spending is a core responsibility of the federal government, so using your numbers the welfare budget is about 48% which isn't that bad, interesting whenever anyone brings up the welfare budget we do not see that person ever comment on the cost of the government's employment services or the aged pension part of the welfare budget which is aged based rather than employable based.
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They aren't 'my' figures.
Aged pension is by default part of welfare, is it not?
 
Bombermania said:
Yes and the main driver of that is the aged pension, which will continue to rise as the baby boomers move into retirement but here is the good news, the population that follows is smaller and will benefit from compulsory super so the rise will moderate over time.
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There is decreasing tax revenue and an ageing population.
Some on here have declared that automation will be making most work redundant, so if you don't have an income, how can you build superannuation?
If your job is one series of casualised or contracted positions, how does that build your super?
 
JackOutback said:
The vast majority of welfare is the aged pension, but I don't see your or anyone else saying oldies should get a pay cut, it's always the unemployed, which make up a much smaller part of those figures.
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We must read the same posts in a different way.
I've repeatedly seen people make mention of asset tests for age pension taking into account the ownership of multi million dollar homes and also claiming an age pension.

Why dont you tell us how you see age pensions should be cut and by what amount?
 
CheapCharlie said:
There is decreasing tax revenue and an ageing population.
Some on here have declared that automation will be making most work redundant, so if you don't have an income, how can you build superannuation?
If your job is one series of casualised or contracted positions, how does that build your super?
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Contractual roles do come with super.
 
CheapCharlie said:
They aren't 'my' figures.
Aged pension is by default part of welfare, is it not?
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Negative gearing, tax cuts for private health insurance,tax breaks for putting money in super(salary sacrifice),franking credits for people who dont pay tax,tax breaks for rich farmers to heat their house with tax free diesel,trust fund laws etc etc .
 
CheapCharlie said:
Is there a particular reason you bother posting?
U don't seem add much of value, and your most common response is a poor attempt to ridicule people you disagree with
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Will you ever stop repeating banal nonsense and actually think for yourself?
Welfare payments are means tested. They will never ever be eliminated. You can make it as hard as possible for welfare recipients it won't make an iota difference to the quantum of the budget spend on welfare.
 
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